A New York escort’s e-mails have led to the discovery of the alleged “inappropriate sexual behavior” of a former headmaster of the posh Brooks School near Boston.

The unnamed escort sent “disturbing e-mails” to the prep school in North Andover after former head Lawrence W. Becker allegedly hired her during a night out in 2011. Her threats to the school sparked an investigation that also discovered that Becker, the headmaster from 1986 to 2008, had engaged in a “questionable” relationship with a student while he ran the school.

In an e-mail to alumni and parents sent Thursday, school officials said the school received “disturbing e-mails” about Becker, 71, last summer from an anonymous writer. The e-mail said, “Mr. Becker eventually acknowledged . . . that he was being threatened by someone who, we later learned, was an escort whom Mr. Becker had hired in the fall of 2011.”

This prompted them to look into his tenure and they uncovered the alleged relationship with a student and a separate case of alleged “inappropriate sexual behavior” while traveling alone on school business” in 2004 when he was headmaster. According to the Boston Globe, “Larry Becker was on the receiving end of some very disturbing phone calls from an escort he apparently hired during a work-related trip to New York City.” Karen Schwartzman, a crisis p.r. specialist retained by the school, told us the school had not contacted the police over the “disturbing e-mails” and phone calls from the escorts.

Becker, who is still married and lives in Cape Cod and Florida, said in a statement, “The communication to alumni, parents and friends from the school, which I loved and to which I devoted myself for 22 years causes me and my wife great pain, sadness and embarrassment. In including information about my private life . . . and given the current climate in schools today, it encourages serious questions and speculation about my relationships with students over the years . . . They know the answers to those questions. I leave the responses to them.” Brooks School, which said it has “grave concerns about Mr. Becker’s relationship with a student,” charges a boarding tuition of $49,365. Alums include publishing exec Steve Forbes and actors Anthony Perkins, Parker Stevenson and Michael Weatherly.